.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1991, 1993
.\"	The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.
.\"
.\" This code is derived from software contributed to Berkeley by
.\" Chris Torek and the American National Standards Committee X3,
.\" on Information Processing Systems.
.\"
.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
.\" are met:
.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
.\"    notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
.\"    documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
.\"    may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
.\"    without specific prior written permission.
.\"
.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
.\" ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
.\" SUCH DAMAGE.
.\"
.\"     @(#)strcpy.3	8.1 (Berkeley) 6/4/93
.\" $FreeBSD: head/lib/libc/string/strcpy.3 262890 2014-03-07 15:35:54Z eadler $
.\"
.Dd February 28, 2009
.Dt STRCPY 3
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm stpcpy, stpncpy, strcpy , strncpy
.Nd copy strings
.Sh LIBRARY
.Lb libc
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.In string.h
.Ft char *
.Fn stpcpy "char * restrict dst" "const char * restrict src"
.Ft char *
.Fn stpncpy "char * restrict dst" "const char * restrict src" "size_t len"
.Ft char *
.Fn strcpy "char * restrict dst" "const char * restrict src"
.Ft char *
.Fn strncpy "char * restrict dst" "const char * restrict src" "size_t len"
.Sh DESCRIPTION
The
.Fn stpcpy
and
.Fn strcpy
functions
copy the string
.Fa src
to
.Fa dst
(including the terminating
.Ql \e0
character.)
.Pp
The
.Fn stpncpy
and
.Fn strncpy
functions copy at most
.Fa len
characters from
.Fa src
into
.Fa dst .
If
.Fa src
is less than
.Fa len
characters long,
the remainder of
.Fa dst
is filled with
.Ql \e0
characters.
Otherwise,
.Fa dst
is
.Em not
terminated.
.Sh RETURN VALUES
The
.Fn strcpy
and
.Fn strncpy
functions
return
.Fa dst .
The
.Fn stpcpy
and
.Fn stpncpy
functions return a pointer to the terminating
.Ql \e0
character of
.Fa dst .
If
.Fn stpncpy
does not terminate
.Fa dst
with a
.Dv NUL
character, it instead returns a pointer to
.Li dst[n]
(which does not necessarily refer to a valid memory location.)
.Sh EXAMPLES
The following sets
.Va chararray
to
.Dq Li abc\e0\e0\e0 :
.Bd -literal -offset indent
char chararray[6];

(void)strncpy(chararray, "abc", sizeof(chararray));
.Ed
.Pp
The following sets
.Va chararray
to
.Dq Li abcdef :
.Bd -literal -offset indent
char chararray[6];

(void)strncpy(chararray, "abcdefgh", sizeof(chararray));
.Ed
.Pp
Note that it does
.Em not
.Tn NUL
terminate
.Va chararray
because the length of the source string is greater than or equal
to the length argument.
.Pp
The following copies as many characters from
.Va input
to
.Va buf
as will fit and
.Tn NUL
terminates the result.
Because
.Fn strncpy
does
.Em not
guarantee to
.Tn NUL
terminate the string itself, this must be done explicitly.
.Bd -literal -offset indent
char buf[1024];

(void)strncpy(buf, input, sizeof(buf) - 1);
buf[sizeof(buf) - 1] = '\e0';
.Ed
.Pp
This could be better achieved using
.Xr strlcpy 3 ,
as shown in the following example:
.Pp
.Dl "(void)strlcpy(buf, input, sizeof(buf));"
.Pp
Note that because
.Xr strlcpy 3
is not defined in any standards, it should
only be used when portability is not a concern.
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr bcopy 3 ,
.Xr memccpy 3 ,
.Xr memcpy 3 ,
.Xr memmove 3 ,
.Xr strlcpy 3 ,
.Xr wcscpy 3
.Sh STANDARDS
The
.Fn strcpy
and
.Fn strncpy
functions
conform to
.St -isoC .
The
.Fn stpcpy
and
.Fn stpncpy
functions conform to
.St -p1003.1-2008 .
.Sh HISTORY
The
.Fn stpcpy
function first appeared in
.Fx 4.4 ,
and
.Fn stpncpy
was added in
.Fx 8.0 .
.Sh SECURITY CONSIDERATIONS
The
.Fn strcpy
function is easily misused in a manner which enables malicious users
to arbitrarily change a running program's functionality through a
buffer overflow attack.